


Double Your Pleasure

by spikesgirl58



Category: Original Work
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-21
Updated: 2013-05-21
Packaged: 2017-12-12 13:42:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,937
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/812214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spikesgirl58/pseuds/spikesgirl58
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Guy knew there was something wrong with his twins.  He just didn't know how wrong.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Double Your Pleasure

He could hear them whispering above his head, those hateful little whispers.  He tried to move.  He knew he was hurt bad.  He couldn’t feel his legs; to be honest, he couldn’t feel anything.

“Is he dead?”

“I’d like him to be dead.”

“I wish he was dead.”

“Let’s kill him”

“Please don’t do this to me.  I’m your father.”  Yet even as Guy spoke the words, he knew better.

“Liar!”

When Annette had come to him with news of her pregnancy, he’d felt the first thrill of being a father.  Finally they were going to have a child, possibly even a son, whom he could love and raise.  Then the news doubled.  Twins.  They were going to have twins.

“I didn’t know twins ran in Annette’s side of the family,” Mom said one night at dinner.

“They don’t,” Guy said.  He was eating with them on account of Annette being too sick to make him food.  Their friend, Jimmy, was sitting with her so she wouldn’t be alone.  Everyone said the man was no good, but it didn’t seem to matter.  Jimmy always had plenty of friends and plenty of money, though how it got it was a mystery.  Guy had never known the man to work a day in his life.  Guy never liked Jimmy growing up and he liked him even less now, but he was sure good to Annette.

“Well, they don’t run in ours, either.  You ain’t been taking any funny medicine, have you, boy?” 

Pop was joshing, Guy knew that, but he grew beet red. “No, sir, I ain’t done it no way but the usual way.”

“Jimmy’s a twin.” Mom was clearing the table and Guy’s throat closed up at her announcement.  “I’m just saying, son.”

The words echoed in his head as he tromped home.  As he approached their trailer, hell, his trailer, he was paying for it; he saw shadows dancing across the living room drapes, shadows that he didn’t like the looks of.

                                                                                                ****

When the nurse handed him his daughters, Guy was ready to fall in love.  The babies stared back at him with cold dark eyes, Jimmy’s eyes.  They were only just born and they knew he wasn’t their father. 

Still, he played along, welcoming these strangers into their home as his own.  Tina, born two minutes earlier than Grace, was the born leader.  It was as if they worked in tandem to make him crazy.  But he didn’t let on.

The trouble started soon after they brought the twins home.  They tried to christen the babies, but the wailing was too much for the good Father to bear.  In fact, Grace twisted so much that he dropped her, fracturing her collarbone.  It was just a freak accident that Tina, flailing and screaming, caught a cross and sent it crashing onto the priest.  He died of complications. 

That’s when they started noticing the crows.  No matter where they went, there were crows around.   He’d wake up in the middle of the night and hear them pecking at the window. 

He went out one day and found the old farm dog dead and half eaten.  Crows hopped around his body, pecking and jousting for a better position.  Guy grabbed his .22 and blasted as many of them as he good.  Rusty had been a good old dog.  He deserved better.

Then Pop had an accident with the tractor and plow.  Something, he swore it was a crow, knocked him from the tractor and the plow cut clean through his leg.  It was providence that he was found when he was or he would have bled to death.

Then the cows started getting sick and their milk ran out.  The farm, which has once flourished, now struggled on a daily basis.

“It’s a nice day.  I’m gonna take the girls out,” Guy announced one summer afternoon.  There was nothing for him to do, not really. 

 Annette got a weird look in her eyes.  She hadn’t been right since the delivery.  It has been hard on her, but the doctors couldn’t quite figure out why.   While the babies flourished, Annette withered.  It got so bad that she couldn’t even breast feed them anymore.  Annette didn’t seem very upset by it.  She stayed as far away from the babies as everyone else did.

“I wish you wouldn’t, Guy.  It’s so much trouble for you.”

“No trouble.  Can’t a father parade his girls around town?”  He tried hard to sound proud, but he knew it never reached his eyes.

“Take Shelia with you.  In case…”

“In case of what?”

“Things.”  She glanced at the window where a crow was perched and left it at that.

“Okay.”

They had gotten to the park, just a patch of ground, bracketed by thick forest on one side and the main road on the other.  There was a gazebo in the middle and some benches along a dusty path.  The park was strangely deserted this afternoon.  It was just them and the crows. 

Guy looked up the path and saw Jimmy coming up their way.  It was the first time he’s seen him since the twins were born.  He saw Guy and the baby carriage and headed towards the woods.

“Hey, Shelia, why don’t you go get us some ice cream?  I’m sure Old Man Miller still has some left.”

“All right… I could use a rest room break anyhow.”  Sheila pulled her sweater closer and hurried away.

Guy waited until she was around the bend, then got to his feet and rapidly pushed the carriage down the path.  The nice thing about never leaving the town you were born in was that you knew your way around.  Jimmy, a drifter at heart, didn’t.

Jimmy came around the corner and let out a little cry of surprise at the sight of Guy blocking his path with a baby carriage.

“Hey, Guy.”  His voice had a false sense of bravado to it.

“Hey, Jimmy.”

“What are you doing here?”

“I thought you’d like to see the babies – them being yours and all.”

Jimmy paled and took a step back.  “Don’t know what you’re talking about, Guy.  I’ve heard what’s being whispered.  Those devils aren’t mine.”

The twins were reaching, their tiny hands clutching at the air in an attempt to get to him.  Tina made funny little noises, thick guttural grunts.

“I think you’re wrong, Jimmy.  Look at them.  They want their daddy.  Guess you messed up big this time and I’m gonna make sure everyone knows whose mess this is.”

“But that’s your job, Guy.  You always were good at cleaning up messes.  After all, shoveling shit is your job.”

Guy’s fist flew and punched Jimmy hard in the face.  The blow knocked him back and he stumbled over a pile of rocks. He fell backwards, his arms wind-milled in an attempt to stay upright.  It was too little too late.  Jimmy went over backward and his head cracked against a rock.

“Not anymore.”  Guy turned and stopped.  Both babies stared at him, their eyes wide, as if they’d known what he’d done.  “He did this to your mama.  If he’d been a man, he’d stood up for you.  I’m your father and don’t you forget it!”  He could tell they didn’t believe him.

                                                                                ****                                    

The years passed slowly.  Tina and Grace grew into toddlers.  Their raven hair fell in thick strands to their shoulders, making people stop and stare. Their skin was alabaster white, their cheeks rosy.  They looked like the perfect children until you got to their eyes. 

The twins wanted no part of society. They kept to themselves, never associating with children their own age.  Whenever a child tried to approach them, something happened.  A toy was broken, a name was called, or an injury was inflicted.  Soon, no child would even want to be in the same room as the twins.  And that was fine with them.  They would sit and talk in their own language, darting looks about to make sure no one got to close.

Guy went about his daily chores, always happy to get out of the house and away from those eyes.  Annette was a mere shell of a woman now, old and twisted at just thirty.  She did her best to dote upon the girls, as if trying to appease them and garner their good will. 

“Guy?”  Annette was sitting at the kitchen table, her hair hanging in limp strands, still wearing a house coat and slippers.

“What?”

“Could you maybe not go to the barn today?  Maybe you could stay here and we could watch TV or do whatever you want

 “I don’t think so.”

“I’m not well, Guy, and I’m scared.”

“Scared of what?”

“Of them.”  She glanced towards the hall, but there was no sign of the twins.  “I think they are trying to kill me.”

“Guess you should have thought of that before you and Jimmy did the Bone Dance then.  You want protection, go to him.”

“You know he’s just a vegetable now, ever since he fell and hit his head.  All he can do is sit and drool.”

“God in his infinite wisdom.”  Guy turned and the twins were there, staring at him.  He spit and walked out.

That night Annette was dead.  The coroner said it was cancer or something.  Guy knew better.  He’d seen the large black feathers and plucked them out of her mouth.  Annette was dead and Guy knew exactly who killed her.

He slept in the camper that night, with everything locked tight and his deer rifle in his arms.

Most folks said their goodbyes to Annette at the funeral home.  It was just him and his two daughters at the gravesite.    Annette’s casket had already been lowered into the hole and all that remained was for the groundskeepers to shovel the dirt back in.

“Goodbye, Old Girl,” he murmured, kneeling in the reddish dirt.  “It wasn’t much of a run for you, but I’ll make it right now.”

“What do you mean?”  Tina’s voice lacked the sweet sibilance of a normal child’s voice.  Hers was harsh and curiously flat.

“Means I’m sending you away some place where they will lock you up and treat you like the monsters you--”

He never got to finish the statement.  A crow dropped from the sky and into his face.  With a cry, he toppled backwards into the open grave, his back cracking as it slammed into Annette’s coffin.  He could hear them whispering above his head, those hateful little whispers, and he tried to move.  He knew he was hurt bad.  He couldn’t feel his legs; to be honest, he couldn’t feel anything.

“Is he dead?”

“I’d like him to be dead.”

“I wish he was dead.”

“Let’s kill him”

“Please don’t do this to me.  I’m your father.”  Yet even as Guy spoke the words, he knew better.

“Liar!”  A shower of dirt fell on his face and into his mouth, choking him.  He tried to move, screaming with the effort, even as more and more dirt poured in on him until sweet oblivion took him.

Grace looked into the hole.  “He’s quiet.”

“Good.”  Tina brushed her hands off, careful to keep her dress neat and clean.  A crow landed besides her and took a few hops.  She laughed and petted its head.

Turning, she held out her hand and her sister took it.  They started down the cemetery path, alone and quite happy to be that way.

“Tina?”

“Yes, Grace?”

“What are we going to do now?”

Her big sister by two minutes smiled.  “Let’s skip.”

 

 


End file.
